Discussing a Downfall

So, did you hear about so-and-so?
I know, I can't believe it either. Who woulda thunkit, ya know?
And you know what else I heard?
I swear. That other person told me, and they know because they are friends with so-and-so's second cousin...

Sounds like a cheesy high school church group skit about the dangers of gossip, right? Yeah, it's not. It's things that actually have been said...by me, in the past, certainly, I'll admit...more recently, about me and mine...and there's nothing cheesy about the devastation lying below the surface of a seemingly breezy conversation.

I've been there, on the one hand, when it's of course not gossip...it's "sharing information" or "prayer requests" or yeah, just gossip. To my shame, I have participated in it, weaving cautionary tales out of barely understood half-truths and whispers of what probably didn't happen. I've also been on the side of earnestly warning against the dangers of gossip and the hurtful consequences and c'mon, people, it's just not christian to talk about other people like that. It's easy to forget that actual hurting people are somewhere at the bottom of the leaning tower of "did you hear".

And now...the fodder and impetus have converged to make me the headliner of the next cautionary tale to be shared at a "prayer meeting" near you. And of course, as is 100% of the time always the case, I'm seeing the whole concept through different eyes.

For me, the story went like this:
1. First, a series of unfortunate events happened. Right away, that's sad, but also right away, people in charge and other people not even remotely necessary to the plot started relying on everything except actually talking to the people involved to construct a story line. I was so busy being sad for a while that I wasn't really aware that there were these whole other conversations happening.
2. By the time I realized that other conversations were happening, I was in angry-at-the-world mode and promptly became pissed beyond reason and had several vilifying rants about "how dare they" and "who do they think they are" and "church 1, actual hurting person 0" and etc ad nauseam ad infinitum. I also had a very literal ache in my heart that spanned so many levels.
3. After, well, during, the pissed part came the "I'm gonna fix this" part. I declared a holy war of retribution and I was determined to root out the culprits and expose them in all their two-faced glory.
4. Then...I actually thought about it for five seconds before exploding (a modern-day miracle in and of itself)...and I thought..."Meh. It's sad that they have nothing else better to do than make up crap about me, who in the scheme of things is not really anybody worth all the whispering."
5. Then I saw this on Pinterest (vicious enemy of the best-laid time management plans):

And you know what...it's absolutely true. I get to choose who participates in my life on a regular basis...and "they" aren't invited. I don't have to ferret out the culprit or report them to the credentials board or make sure their sins (equally as devastating to the heart of God, even if seemingly more benign) are broadcast or really even worry about them at all. They are not my problem.

I get it. I really do. There's a certain satisfying hubris in assuring oneself and other people that we are not as bad or as broken or as whatever as so-and-so. In humanity's favorite game of self-justification, it's nice to come out "better" on the broken scale than someone else.

I spent some time feeling very miserable and disillusioned that this was happening in "christian" circles...but a friend made a very good (and rather sad) point: You often find more mercy and grace in tangible form from "prostitutes and publicans", because they are aware of the great need for it. In my ongoing struggle for reconciliation with church, there are topics like this one that just contribute to the difficulty of continuing the fight. I'm not making a blanket judgment about church, because I know it's mostly a person-by-person thing (I'm absurdly blessed to have a few friends from the ministry who are some of my biggest cheerleaders on this road to redemption). But even I was shocked when a supposedly well-intentioned pastor's wife sat down and told me how she wanted to be friends and she was okay with whatever my story was...and when she actually heard the story, she dropped off the face of the earth as far as I'm concerned and I haven't heard a peep out of her since. She got the deets...and took the first exit. And then there are the people I have met outside church, who are all very conscious of their own "sh** happens" stories, that have overwhelmed me with ridiculous generosity and tangible grace and mercy.

So, I guess the conversation continues for me and church. Actually, I think I'm going to pause that conversation for a while. Sometimes I get sick of repeating myself. I'm still holding out hope for the dialogue with Jesus, because I know He's only talking to me about my stuff and extending grace and mercy and unexpected blessings every single time He thinks I'll listen.

Church Hurts

I was going to start out by saying that I'm not supposed to say that sometimes church hurts, but let's face it: my whole life is one big "not supposed to" right now. So, I'm just going to say it like it is.

Sometimes going to church hurts. Actually, specifically, for the last 7 months or so, it has more than hurt. It has eviscerated. It has devitalized. It has been discouraging. Disappointing. Damaging. It has been all of those awful things and more. And I'm not supposed to say that.

I think I'm supposed to say that all things work together for good. Or that God knows what He's doing. Or that He didn't bring me this far just to leave me. Or that He doesn't give us more than we can handle. Or any of a number of platitudes that just don't actually suffice when one's soul grieves with a primal, visceral ache.

What I'm not supposed to say is that I don't feel it. I'm not supposed to say that right now going to church is an absolute exercise in blind and begrudging obedience. I'm not supposed to say that I sit in church and I can't sing and I can barely make it through the message and forget about any kind of response. I'm not supposed to say that I'm hurting...and that church doesn't seem to notice. I'm not supposed to say that the words "faith promise" and "missions Sunday" are like battery acid in open eyes. I'm not supposed to say that this is hard. And that some days I question my sanity. And that every time I walk through those doors I'm bracing myself for reactions, looks, comments, unexpected encounters.

If I were just a regular person with some crazy, ah-ma-zing back story, I don't think it would feel nearly as awful. But my back story is the "good girl" story - Bible college, married, ministry, missions. My back story is doing all the seemingly right things...and ending up flat on my face anyway. My back story is not actually okay with church...church likes to redeem the lost, but not so much to help the found who are hurting. My current story is sadly typical, of the "you cannot make this stuff up" variety...end of marriage, end of career, end of missions, start of new strange life that never occurred to me before now.

I had no Plan B...and church doesn't encourage Plan Bs. I know that church doesn't encourage Plan Bs because I've preached that sermon. I've delivered that message in one-on-one's, women's groups, potlucks, Sunday services, missions board meetings. And I've had those pitying conversations about so-and-so and where they ended up.

I sound bitter. Rereading this, I realize that it sounds like I'm bitter. I'm not. And I don't need to be told to let go and let God. I'm hurting. I'm a human being who's been sucker punched and then smacked in the face by my humanity. And I sit in the pew by myself on Saturday night, most times with tears streaming down my face. And no one talks to me. One little old(er) lady asked if it was my first time, and when I said no, I got the stereotypical "look down the nose", as if, since it wasn't my first time, I should really sing and shake hands and be part of church.

Church and I have not been friends, for decades really. And it's taken this one final humiliation in a long string of off-putting doses of reality for me to realize something basic. Church can't and won't fix me, and it has nothing to do with me following the formula.

I think I still have, buried somewhere deep, the audacity to believe that maybe Jesus can fix me. I'm frustrated with Him right now, and I have questions that feel unanswerable, but He knows that. I've let Him know. And He's okay with that. He can take it. He got frustrated too when His human side kept Him from being cool with God and His questions hung in the air, and He let God know about it. I think Jesus gets me, actually, and I'm not just saying that because I'm supposed to. Even when church hurts...disembowels...lays low...Jesus gets me. And that's enough for right now.

Lie to Me

So....it's January. I guess I'm on target for two entries per year - good thing blogging is not my job! 2012 was not a great year. Not at all. And 2013? As it's January, the jury is still out but let's just say the evidence so far is not in favor of it being an improvement on its predecessor.

In December and January people tend to get introspective, thinking about things that have happened and making plans, or at least imagining intentions, for a better future. I have a long and checkered past of hunkering down with my paper and pencil on December 31st, scratching out some half-hearted promise of change for the better in the following 12 months. It's hard to fathom what the future, even the near future, will bring, and I don't think I ever got one thing right.

The past can be just as tricky. And we have a tendency to want to rewrite the story. We want to remember things in a way that suits us...our temperament, our image, the argument we are in at the time. And memory itself is unreliable - every cop show on TV preaches that. I am not immune to the temptation (I've been known to embellish history myself).

This weekend I am alone, and was supposed to spend all day today working. Instead (shocker), I had a Netflix marathon of Lie to Me. It's really fascinating, a crime procedural based on micro-expressions and universal signs of emotion. In one episode, they asked a guy who was clearly making crap up on the go to reverse the timeline and tell his story backwards. Of course he couldn't, because it's impossible to remember all the lies, especially the spontaneous ones.

I'm struggling at the moment with not rewriting history. Even though I don't want to, I think I lie to me sometimes. I tend to see things through the lens of whatever I'm feeling at the moment, or whatever I want to prove. Seldom were things actually as awful - or as epic -  as I remember them. In the heat of an argument it's easy to start throwing around words like "always" and "never", which definitely leads to a rewrite of history, i.e. a lie. It's hard to step back and take a breath and really evaluate what happened and how it applies. I mean, that's what the psychologists and counselors want you to do, and they've even invented a magnet to help the conversation have those kinds of pauses (I'm not kidding, it's yellow and white and you're supposed to hand it back and forth and....I digress). But it's hard to do when accusations are flying and hearts are shattering.

Sometimes I want to lie to me. I want to remember something differently or explain it differently or just....do it over differently. I want to think I wasn't such a jerk, or so insensitive...or so ignorant. I want to lie to me so that I sound better than I was, so that the offense I caused was smaller, so that the cues I missed were less obvious. I want to lie to me so that the other person is the ogre, so that I'm the victim, so that it wasn't my fault, at all or in part. Sometimes the facts are the facts and my memory is skewed, which is also a kind of lie. I guess I could take a cue from the show and watch my face and body language for tells...but...that means I would have to always be talking to myself in a mirror...which would be awkward....or maybe it's time for serious introspection, turning the mirror on my thought processes and trying to not lie to me, or at least to start recognizing those universal expressions. And I can pay more attention to the tells, the "indicators and manipulators", the emotional cues, the non-verbals that shout so loudly, so nobody else can lie to me, either.

So that's how that feels...

Wow. It's August. It's been a while...always is a while between posts for me. Soooo much has happened since February...where to start...

Well, let's start by saying that there's a lot I won't be saying here. I don't think it's good or healthy to verbally vomit all the sordid details of one's life all over the inter-webs (kind of begs the question of a personal blog, but that's another topic for another day). I can say, in summary, that my life has been crazy and extremely off-plan. 

Today my precious boys started school...so did mostly everyone else's kids, but it feels like a much bigger deal for mine. For Number One Boy, he only spent one tiny semester of Kindergarten in the States and for Junior Prince, he's never been to school in the States. It may be a bigger deal for me than for them, but I'm...worried...concerned...preoccupied...not sure what word is most appropriate here. Number One is excited that maybe he'll actually be challenged and learned something this year...Junior Prince is terrified and I'm telling you, those eyes of his shred his mommy's heart when they are half-filled with tears and silent pleas for rescue. The social scene is different here...the classroom schedules and techniques are different here....there are way more kids at this school here...and I survived so I'm sure they will too. I'm just desperately praying for more than survival...for success, in whatever shape that takes...for friends...for no bullies...

It's sort of symbolically the first day of everything new for me too. I can honestly say that I did not see this "season" coming (I'm not talking about sending my kids to school anymore). My life looks so different than anything I ever visualized. It is not that "so much better than I ever dreamed" kind of different...it's a "I had no idea it could happen to me" different. 

In my previous line of work, there were a lot of expectations, a lot of ideals, a lot of unspoken obligations. As a fully cognizant participant in that line of work, I had a very officious set of opinions and ideas and sermonettes that I could dish out at a moment's notice. I had definite ideas about what "should" and "should not" be done in a variety of situations. I had sharp opinions about situations and things that I didn't comprehend on any level other than theoretical. In short, I had no freakin' clue. 

Now that my life, the one that's mine, has taken some unexpected twists and painful detours, I'm finally learning how to keep my mouth shut...how to edit myself...how to wait before opinionizing (yep, made that word up...deal with it)...how to give lots and lots of grace for the human-type blunders that everyone makes. I mean, let's be real, I still have opinions...but I realize that until I am the one in the situation, there's no way to know what that situation feels like. 

So...I guess you could say I've been sent back to school too. Bring on the school, bring on the books...and thank goodness for a Teacher who doesn't give dirty looks. Ever. I'm really grateful for that right now.

The Stuff One Sees at the Beach

So, I went to the beach this weekend...by myself! First of all, that never happens and second, it was divine. I had a purpose, aside from entertaining my inner beach bum: I had signed up for the Energizer Night Race being held in Viña del Mar, Chile, with the super odd distance of 8.2 km. I don't know how they came up with 8.2 but whatever, 8.2 it was. And of course, since it was a trip I planned all by my lonesome, the logistics got confuzzled and I ended up going on Friday and coming home on Sunday for a Saturday night race (don't ask). I chose to see the glass all the way full on this one!

So, Friday afternoon, I took myself and my (rather heavy) duffle bag (only 2 nights, come on) to the bus station. Call me a nerd, but I was excited about taking my first "real" bus trip (a two hour bus ride might not seem like a real bus ride but trust me, it was). I actually enjoyed taking the subway downtown, trying to find the correct terminal (second time's the charm, apparently), trying to get on the wrong bus about 5 times, watching all the back-packers, wincing at all the screaming kids, marveling at amount of luggage people lug on a bus, etc. The bus ride itself was fairly boring - I'm guessing because I...fell asleep... and have no idea if anything exciting happened or not. And then, of course the bus arrived and there was a new terminal to inspect and tourist-trappers to ignore and a bed & breakfast to be located (absolutely recommend: amweinberg.cl). All awesome. I got checked in, dropped off the infernal duffle (note to self: time to invest in one of those cool backpacks), and headed to the mall to pick up my kit.

So, first of all, normally, I'm a walking GPS, but that mall dominated me. I could't stinkin' find the Nike store to pick up my kit!! It must have been quite a sight, the solitary gringa roaming the passageways with a confused-changing-to-swearing-in-symbols-under-my-breath expression. Turns out, it was in a "new addition" on the other side of the road and...grrr...saving grace, Starbucks, with a really cool Lego store above it. And the kit was good for a few laughs - one of the sponsors was Banana Boat and they oh-so-thoughtfully provided a nice can of sunscreen...for a night race...but whatever... And then I took myself to the beach for a lovely stroll in the sunset. :)

Saturday dawned grey and cold...dude, it's summer and I was at the beach...not once did "cold" enter the equation... Anyhow, I found my way to, you guessed it, the other Starbucks, conveniently located on the beach #biggrin and #itdoesntgetanybetter. I had on a very light sweater over a tank top and decided it would be grand to walk about five miles along the beach. I really really wanted to run but was trying to conserve my strength for the blistering 8.2 km I would experience that night. I got fearfully and wonderfully sunburned on the way back (idiot, the sunscreen was for the day of, not the actual race!). And here are some interesting things I saw:
*a solitary soul playing bag-pipes on the beach (no lie)
*some VERY unfortunate mullets
*electric blue jeans and a rainbow-striped shirt...on an old dude...wow
*the Divine Elvis aka the homeless guy wearing a red choir robe and playing a drum set mounting on a shopping cart
*a true albino
All of it = awesomeness!

And then...the race... I love running, and normally I like to run alone. But I have learned that participation in races is sort of a group thing. It would appear to be way more fun "with" rather than "without" friends (note to self: work on this for the next one, deadline 1 April). Well, to clarify: the stretching and hanging out for two hours before the race would be way more fun "with". The actual running part I'm still okay with doing by myself...although it would be nice to see a friendly face coming into, say, km 7.6 or something. It really was a fun race...everyone had head lamps and there was no illumination on the course... and it was at the horse track, so it was a couple big loops through sand and grass and whatnot. And very few women passed me, and I actually passed a bunch of guys, so that rocked too.

And that was it, except for the total lack of taxis and the slightly panicky walk through Viña at midnight by myself, and the freezingness of the night for which I was ill-prepared, and then I went to sleep and got up and went to Starbucks and said good-bye to the beach and got back on the bus and came home. How's that for a 5-star weekend! (And I had some pictures but they're lost in email-landia. Maybe I'll get back to it. Probably not, though.)

That Didn't Come Out Right...

Language learning is a _____ process. Fill in the blank - if you've never learned another language, try to imagine it... yourself, a competent adult, able to do things like order in a restaurant, express an opinion, ask for directions, call the cable guy... and then put yourself in a place where NOTHING is familiar, save signs for things like Coke and Levis and the occasional smash-up word like googlear (the act of googling, I kid you not).

Now, I've been in this process for 8 years now... yes, count them, 8... and I have learned a lot. I'm actually quite capable in my adopted tongue. But there are days when absolutely nothing comes out right! Most of the time I know it's me, that I'm having a "boca gringa" day (the days when my pronunciation is laughable), that I'm not coming up with the right words. Then there are days when I promise you, it is not me, it's them....

The other day I was in a coffee shop for a meeting (all meetings require caffeination, right?). Not to brag, but I know what I'm doing when it comes to ordering coffee. This is not a problem area for me. And so I waited at the counter for the guy to quit messing around and pay attention. I was a little annoyed, but whatever. So... I ordered my coffee. It wasn't even elaborate, it was just a plain latte with skim milk. The guy looked at me as if I were speaking Martian or Chinese or something. He repeated back to me an order I never even thought of making, with flavors and who knows what. I calmly (counting under my breath) repeated my quite simple order in a clear, slow voice. He repeated back to me... something else entirely, different from the first and definitely not what I had said. His co-worker corrected him, repeating what I had said. He turned and looked at me with this confused look on his face, and right then and there I had a very unholy moment.

The things is, I'm usually fairly confident in my language skills. But days like that make me wonder... I'm currently studying for a big competency exam mid-November, and I have my rock star days and my Napoleon Dynamite days. I want to know everything - all the vocabulary, why they use this word this way one day and another way the next, the culturally loaded meanings behind things, how to write and speak in such a way that no one suspects I wasn't born with this gift... I know that herculean task is impossible, but I'd like to know enough to at least have a rock star day at test time.

So, I keep turning on the radio and reading the newspaper and watching the sitcoms. I bug my friends incessantly with the whys and the whats and the how comes. I take the plunge and say stuff and laugh along when it comes out so lame. And then I just shrug and say, "That didn't come out right..." and start again...

Like running on the beach

I adore the beach. I was born by the beach. I always turn to the beach (when I can) for that sense of well-being and peace that is hard to find in the city.

I also adore the idea of running on the beach. The movies make it look so easy! The light is amazing (no matter what time of day is being portrayed) and the girl or guy just saunters along the sand, in shoes or barefoot, looking super relaxed and stress-free, clothes billowing, hair blowing... yeah, it is not that easy. It's really hard and really... disappointing. My fantasy of waltzing along the beach, burning calories and looking fabulous, is, well, a fantasy.

The reality, for me at least, is pounding the city streets, dodging cars, stalling at red lights, sweat streaming, inhaling untold quantities of smog, gasping for those last few hundred meters...

I like running in the city. I really do. I like watching people as I run. I like seeing visible progress in the number of blocks I pass. I even like the sweat, the tangible proof of exertion. It's not always easy to convince myself to strap on the shoes and turn on the tunes and get going, but once I do, it's hard to imagine why it was necessary to convince myself.

Normally, I could turn all this into a huge object lesson, but just this once I'm gonna... not. Someday maybe I'll be able to run on the beach... and someday beyond that I'll be able to make it look easy... or not. Meanwhile, it's time to grab my shoes and my iPod and hit the streets.